Joker 2: The Musical

To quote Heath Ledger’s version of the clown prince of crime, maybe some wag should be scrawling “Why so serious?” on glass-fronted offices at Warner Bros Discovery this week, as executives there contemplate the box-office implosion of Joker: Folie à Deux.

A catastrophic $37.7m opening weekend, the largest second-weekend drop for a DC film (81%), a worldwide take currently standing at a piddling $165m … how has the studio gone from the 2019 original, a billion-grosser that was then the highest earning R-rated film, to this?

If nothing else, the Joker is proving true to his reputation as an agent of chaos. But he is also the most beloved of comic-book villains from a storied franchise; a draw almost on par with Batman himself, making the disaster all the more unthinkable.

With bubonic word of mouth, Joker: Folie à Deux is now projected to lose $125m-200m, depending on whose budget estimate you believe. If it’s the $300m figure being generally touted for production and marketing, then this is clearly what has hobbled the film; it would leave it needing as much as $475m to break even.

Risky reinventions of hallowed pop-cultural icons are a lot more feasible on the first film’s sensible $60m budget.

$300m is a shocking amount. The money is up on the screen in the sense that director Todd Phillips and star Joaquin Phoenix were both paid $20m and supporting actor Lady Gaga $12m; over a quarter of the production budget in total.

But other than beautiful lighting and cinematography, and the climactic sequence, the film doesn’t look outrageously lavish.

A cloistered affair set largely in Arkham State Hospital and the courtroom, there’s virtually nothing in the way of extended CGI pyrotechnics to explain the spend.

The likeliest explanation is that it was a big bet born out of pandemic desperation for a surefire hit when cinemas reopened.

It seems doubly shocking in the light of Phillips and Phoenix choosing to make the film a musical – reportedly first considering it as a Broadway play. (The original’s staircase dance probably should have served as a warning.)

Even on paper, the genre doesn’t promise the kind of returns obliged by the budget, unless you’re a children’s animation.

And the sideways step out of realism into a cracked-voice travesty-musical was never likely to connect with the original’s core audience of Joker fanboys, let alone the embittered incel quotient whose preoccupations it channelled.

Nor do you imagine that Lady Gaga – fine as she is in the role – corresponds to what they’re accustomed to with past psycho-hottie depictions of Harley Quinn.……..

https://www.theguardian.com/film/20...uch-in-the-first-place?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other